KEDAH MATRICULATION COLLEGE

COFFEE CONSUMPTION AND KMK STUDENTS STUDY HABIT

To be submitted to:

Puan Noorazlinda Mohd. Nordin

Group members:

Adrian Chin Zheyu MS1218660929

Choo Lai Yee MS1218532280

Lee Khai Hen MS1218660962

Ong Ee Siang MS1218661057

K4S1P2

22 FEBRUARY 2013

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This project would not have been possible without the support of many people. Many

thanks to my adviser, Puan Noorazlinda Mohd. Nordin, who offered guidance and support thus

helped make some sense of the confusion. The advices are useful for completing the research.

Also thanks to my group members who put in many efforts on this project and provide

the financial needs for completing the project.

Thanks to the students in Kedah Matriculation College who gave cooperation to complete

the research. They are willing to fill up the questionnaire for completing survey.

At last, thanks to some fellow friends that help us on the projects. They provide us some

informations of the research that help us a lot on this research.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION .............................................................................5

1.1 Background ........................................................................................................ 5

1.2 Statement of the Problem.................................................................................... 6

1.3 Objectives of Research………………………………………………………… 6

1.4 Research Questions……………………………………………………………. 6

1.5 Definition of Terms…………………………………………………………….. 7

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW .................................................................. 8

2.1 Literature Review ............................................................................................... 8

2.2 Null Hypothesis…………………………........................................................... 9

CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY ...........................................................................11

3.1 The Research Design .........................................................................................11

3.2 Sampling ............................................................................................................11

3.3 Research Setting ................................................................................................12

3.4 Data Gathering………………………………………………………………....12

3.5 Instrument Use…………………………………………………………………12

CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION......................................................13

CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSIONS ..............................................................................17

5.1 Summary and Conclusions .................................................................................17

5.2 Recommendations/Suggestions ..........................................................................18

REFERENCES/BIBLIOGRAPHY ..........................................................................19

APPENDIX: Questionnaire for the Participants of the Survey.................................20

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LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Figure 1: The Number of Students that Drink Coffee………………………………13

Figure 2: The Number of Students That Drink Coffee While Study………………..14

Figure 3: Coffee Consumption of Students per Day………………………………...14

Figure 4: Ways of Coffee Consumption on Study…………………………………..15

Figure 5: Consumptions Other than Coffee…………………………………………16

Figure 6: Agreement of Coffee Consumption Affecting Study……………………..16

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CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

1.1 BACKGROUND

Studying for an exam can be one of the most stressful events in a student`s life. There are

students who are always nervous and anxious and others find ways to deal with the burden. How

do these students cope with stress? Some will exercise, and others procrastinate. When students

find that stress and anxiety are overwhelming, they often seek alternate solutions. One of those

solutions includes consuming a stimulant called coffee. Coffee relaxes the brain and they feel

more attentive which allow them to study late night.

Coffee generally refers to a beverage made by the infusion, decoction or percolation of

the roasted, ground seeds of the coffee plant* (genus Coffea, and usually C. arabica or C.

canephora / C. robusta). Coffee is prized for its aroma and flavor, and is noted for the fact that it

naturally contains varying levels of caffeine. In coffee cupping, traits of coffee like acidity and

mouth feel are also noted. Coffee elevates neural activity in many parts of the brain, postpones

fatigue, and enhances performance at simple intellectual tasks and at physical work that involves

endurance but not fine motor coordination. Coffee also has its negative side effects. Too much

coffee can cause over-stimulation to the body and brain. It can cause restlessness, anxiety,

difficulty in sleeping, irregular heartbeat and excess amount of acids in the stomach, which can

lead to abdominal pain and nausea. This study is conducted to open up the eyes of the students

about the good and harmful effects of coffee. How coffee is correlated with the anxiety level and

to correct their misconception about the coffee consumption.

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1.2 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

Student nowadays are always busy on their study and often having lack of sleep. They

often consume coffee so that they can stay awake at late night. Drinking coffee can have major

implications on students’ academic performance. College student can be proven one of the most

targeted groups by this type of drinking. However due to the rate of production is so rapid, many

students do not aware of the implications of consumption of caffeine.

1.3 OBJECTIVE OF RESEARCH

The purpose of the study is to assess the relationship between coffee consumption and the study

habits in Kedah Matriculation College. To find whether students’ risk awareness for consume

coffee drinks has effects on them or not, and to determine if the risk awareness of coffee

consumption has effect on their academic performance.

1.4 RESEARCH QUESTIONS

More evidences are needed in regard their coffee consumption habits. This is a gap which

this aimed to get a better understanding how coffee consumption related to their study habits .It

also aimed to answer the following questions:

1) How much students intake coffee while study? 

2) What is the effect of coffee on exam preparation?

3) What are the different views of students about coffee consumption?

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1.5 DEFINITION OF TERMS

1.5.1 OPERATIONAL DEFINITION:

· Factors- these refers to anything that affects study habits

· Study Habits- refers to the ways of studying on a particular subject 

· KMK Students- referring to all officially enrolled students of Kolej Matrikulasi Kedah.

·Coffee – a hot drink made from the roasted and ground bean-like seeds of a tropical shrub.

1.5.2 SCOPE AND LIMITATIONS

The scopes of this research are the KMK students here in Kolej Matrikulasi Kedah of

second semester levels. We involved PST students from Modul 1, 2 and 3 in science stream. The

limitations of this research are only those students that are currently enrolled at KMK and the

limited time period of 3 months is given from 23th December 2012 to 24th February 2013 for

research project.

1.5.3 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

The researchers believes that students, particularly Kolej Matrikulasi Kedah, will be

benefited from the findings of this study since the study provides basis for awareness and better

understanding of how high level of caffeine intake they would result in unhealthy study habits.

Likewise gives them a more focused and clear understanding about positive and negative side

effects of caffeine consumption. Consequently, this awareness also gives a much deeper

understanding of their selves as students. 

Future Researchers, they may be able to use the result of the study in farther research similar to

what the study is. 

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CHAPTER 2

LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 LITERATURE REVIEW

Coffee comes from a shrub-like tree that grows in almost any soil and prefers the climate

between the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn. The coffee tree bears flowers, ripe fruit, and

unripe fruit at the same time. For many, coffee is first and foremost the favored source of

caffeine. Two seeds or beans are found within the fruit of the coffee tree. The first step after

harvesting is to remove these beans from the fruit. This is done in one of two ways; by dry

processing or by wet processing. Wet processing is much more expensive although it is not true

that dry processing always leads to an inferior product.

Coffee has been associated with occupational stress and anxiety about grade point

average and is known to abrupt sleep quality and cause sleep disturbance. (Gurley, 1984). Coffee

ingestion affected sleep and there was high level of daytime sleepiness. Sleep difficulties resulted

in irritability and affected lifestyle and interpersonal relationships.( Department of Physiology,

Shifa College of Medicine. Jan - Jun 2004) 

Smoking and caffeine consumption are performance degraders. They should be avoided

as much as possible. Caffeine is known to cause sleeplessness which in turn leads to fatigue and

a tired brain cannot perform to its peak level when required.(PR Log (Press Release) – Feb 11,

2010). 

Caffeine injects adrenaline into your system, giving you a temporary boost, but possibly

making you fatigued and depressed later. If you take more caffeine to counteract these effects,

you end up spending the day in an agitated state, and might find yourself jumpy and edgy by

night. (Elizabeth Scott, m.s. , 2008)

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Regardless of all the information in research studies, there seems to be little information

on the relationship between caffeine consumption and college students` study habits. We

speculated that students usually consume more coffee when they are preparing and studying for

an exam. As stated earlier, drinking too much coffee is not a positive study habit; therefore, in

our study, we attempted to focus on this area. 

We hypothesized that students who consumed more coffee while studying would exhibit

negative and unhealthy study habits, especially when studying for complicated word problems or

tasks. We looked at demographic variables such as age, gender, class, and major to determine

whether they had any effect on students` coffee consumption and study habits. We wanted to

determine whether caffeine consumption leads students to healthy or unhealthy study habits.

Unhealthy study habits include procrastination, minimal studying time, increased anxiety, and

low levels of information retained by the student.

The purpose of this study was to examine students study habits in reference to caffeine

consumption, the effects of caffeine consumption on students, and how demographic variables

such as age, gender, class, and major affect caffeine consumption when studying for exams. 

2.2 NULL HYPOTHESIS

The null hypotheses are stated below.

i) The high level of coffee intake has no significant relationship with students unhealthy study

habits.

ii) Most of the KMK students are consuming coffee when study.

iii) Coffee can enhance the concentration of students on their studies.

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iv) Students in KMK often study until midnight when preparing a test with consumption of

coffee.

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CHAPTER 3

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

3.1 THE RESEARCH DESIGN

This was correlation study to determine, describe and analyze relationships between coffee

consumption and the dependent variable which is the study habits. It tries to find out the

relationship between the two variables. One variable was students coffee consumption and this

was measured in cups of coffee students consume while study. Another variable was study habits

measured in either healthy or unhealthy. Criteria for healthy study in this study was preparing for

exam at least 1 week before the exams for at least 2-4 hours and not waiting until the night

before or the day of to study. To measure this, a question is mentioned in questionnaire “do you

drink more coffee to study for the test?” and “does coffee help you to concentrate in your study

session?” 

3.2 SAMPLING

We select the sample size of about 50 students in Kolej Matrikulasi Kedah specifically PST

students. Out of which 25 female and 25 male students are chosen through “Convenient

Sampling technique”.

( Convenient sampling means to collect information from members of population who are

conveniently available to provide it)

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3.3 RESEARCH SETTINGS

The study was conducted within PST students in KMK. A total of 50 questionnaires were then

distributed to the students of the PST of KMK, in their respective classrooms, with an

explanation of the aims and objectives of the study.

3.4 DATA GATHERING

The students were asked to participate voluntarily. The purpose of the research is explained to

the participants. For data collection we choose the time of break from 1:00pm to 2:00pm. Every

participant had completed the questionnaire in 5 to 10 minutes.

3.5 INSTRUMENT USE

Self- developed questionnaire composed of 10 items questions will be used to measure Study

Habits and frequency of coffee consumption during study session.

In the students of Kolej Matrikulasi Kedah, data were collected on 10 January 2013. It was a

close end questionnaire. For the convenience of students a paper on which coffee consumption is

mentioned was attached to each questionnaire.

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CHAPTER 4

FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS

Data was analyzed and percentages were calculated.

Over 66% of the students drink coffee. Among the students who drink coffee, there are 51.52%

and 48.48% of male students and female students respectively that drink coffee.

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Male Female0123456789

1011121314151617181920

YesNo

The Number of Students that Drink CoffeeFigure 1: The Number of Students that Drink Coffee

Over 66.67% of students who drink coffee are consuming coffee while study. There are 36.36%

of

male

students and 63.64% of female students consuming coffee while study among the students who

drink coffee while study.

Among the students who drink coffee, over 100% of male students drink 1 cup of coffee

per day whereas 75% of female students drink 1 cup of coffee and 25% of female students drink

2 cups of coffee.

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MaleFemale

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

18 17

12

0

4

00

1 Cup2 CupsMore than 2 Cups

Yes

No

0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16

8

9

14

2

FemaleMale

Figure 2: The Number of Students That Drink Coffee While Study

Figure 3: Coffee Consumption of Students per Day

Among the students who drink coffee, over 30.30% of students drink coffee before study, there

are 30% of female students and 70% of male students among the students who drink coffee

before study. Over 63.64% of students drink coffee during study, there are 61.90% of female

students and 38.10% of male students among them. Over 6.06% of students drink coffee after

study, there are 0% of female students and 100% of male students among them.

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After Study

During Study

Before Study

0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14

2

8

7

0

13

3

FemaleMale

Figure 4: Ways of Coffee Consumption on Study

Figure 5: Consumptions Other than Coffee

Other than consuming coffee, there are 32% of students consume hot chocolate, 18% fruit juices,

10% soft drinks, 10% Nestum, 6% ice lemon tea, 12% milo, 12% soya bean.

Among the students in KMK, over 32% of students think that coffee affects their study. There

are 43.75% of male students and 56.25% of female students among them.

CHAPTER 5

CONCLUSION

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14%

36%

18%

32%

Agree by Male StudentsDisagree by Male StudentsAgree by Female StudentsDisagree by Female Students

12% 6%

10%

10%18%

32%

12%

MiloIce Lemon TeaNestumSoft DrinksFruit JuicesHot ChocolateSoya Bean

Figure 6: Agreement of Coffee Consumption Affecting Study

5.1 SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION

We found that our main hypothesis was true that most of the students consuming coffee

while study. There are 66.67% of students drink coffee while study among the students who

drink coffee. Among the students who drink coffee while study, there are 36.36% of male

students and 63.64% of female students. This indicates that the number of female students who

consume coffee while study are more than male students. Female students are more dependent

on coffee to make them more concentrated on their study. They study until late night, and they

consume coffee to let themselves get alert to concentrate on their study. 32% of students think

that coffee affects their study. This shows that they are depending on coffee while study. Most of

the students drink coffee during their study. This is able to make them concentrate to study.

According to the research students who intake coffee while study have both unhealthy

study habits and healthy study habits. This is based on how the students consume coffee; it may

benefit and may harmful.

5.2 RECOMMENDATIONS/SUGGESTIONS

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There are some suggestions for future studies on study habits and caffeine consumption, they

include: 

1) Finding participants who are willing to participate on a volunteer basis because they

are the ones who will find interest in the topic

2) conduct this study on different college.

3) create a more valid and reliable survey to answer questions that were addressed in this

study.

4) Don’t delimit your study only for one department or group, as this study chosen

KMK students only, to get more depth and true findings.

REFFERENCES

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1. How caffeine affects test taking in college students by Diane Todd (May 06, 2010)

2. The relationship between caffeine consumption and study habits

http://www.mancol.edu/stntlife/ccenter/articles/addicti/caff.html on October 17,

2000

3. sleep habits and their consequences: a survey umar a. khan, sara n. pasha, sarah

k. khokhar, asim a. rizvi

4. from department of physiology, shifa college of medicine, islamabad-

pakistan(original article)

5. tips for students - how to improve study habits during exams? :

http://www.studyskillswebinar.com

6. the relationship between caffeine consumption and the study habits and grades in

college students. university of kentucky

7. low-stress study tips for finals season by elizabeth scott, m.s., about.com guide.

8. updated january 07, 2008

9. a survey of energy drink consumption among college students 

APPENDIX

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QUESTIONNAIRE

COFFEE CONSUMPTION AND KMK STUDENTS STUDY HABIT

PART A

GENDER : MALE ( ) FEMALE ( )

RACE : MALAY ( ) INDIAN ( )

OTHERS ( ) CHINESE ( )

PST : MODUL 1 ( ) MODUL 2 ( )

MODUL 3 ( )

PART B

Purpose: To study the relationship between coffee consumption and KMK students study habits.Direction: Please put check (√) on the point that corresponds to what you are actually doing, thinking, and feeling regarding the statement. There are no right and wrong answers to this questionnaire. Rest assured that your answers will be treated in strictest and will be used only for this study.

1. Do you drink coffee?Yes ( ), if yes please proceed to question 2. No ( ), if no please proceed to question 8.

2. Do you drink coffee while you study?Yes ( ) No ( )

3. How often do you drink coffee per day?1 cup ( ) 2 cups ( )More than 2 cups ( )

4. When do you drink coffee?Before study ( ) During study ( )After study ( )

5. How many cups of coffee do you consume per study session?1 cup ( )

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2 cups ( )More than 2 cups ( )

6. Do you drink more coffee to study for a test?Yes ( ) No ( )

7. Does coffee help you to concentrate in you study session?Yes ( ) No ( )

8. Do you take other consumption other than coffee?Yes ( ), if yes please state : _______________________________ No ( )

9. Do you feel asleep during your study session without coffee?

Yes ( ) No ( )

10. Do you think coffee will affect your study?Yes ( ) No ( )

Comments: ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

ADRIAN CHIN ZHEYU CHOO LAI YEE LEE KHAI HEN

ONG EE SIANG

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